> I have another query here -- If we are building a system that is > supposed to be better than other P2P systems, we should avoid a > central point of failure, ie, no trackers or any central database. In > such a situation, how is the discovery of nodes supposed to take > place? The Gnutella system is nice; a predefined node (which *has* to > be on the network) is pre-programmed into the client, so that the > client can send all the query messages to this node, which can then > forward this query to other nodes it is connected to. But since it > effectively is pinging the entire network, should we avoid such a > system? In other words, how is the discovery of the nodes and the > files present on these nodes, supposed to work?
Many modern p2p networks use some form of DHT[1] for this (even bittorrent supports it now). However, you still have the problem that, like gnutella, you have to know of at least one node on the network to be able to bootstrap into the DHT. > Also, a P2P and client/server hybrid system was suggested, where a > client could query a tracker to get a metalink file and once it has > finished downloading, it can register itself at the tracker, so that > other nodes joining in future could know about this client. Would > skipping a central tracker be feasible here? If yes, then what could > be an alternative to this? Perhaps we could simply have a very simple tracker whose sole purpose is to distribute bootstrapping information for the DHT. That way only completely new people to the network will be unable to access the DHT if the tracker(s) fail, and metalink will allow for graceful fallback to http/ftp/etc in this case. -Aren Olson [1] - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distributed_hash_table -- "Whoever said sunshine brings happiness has never danced in the rain." - K. Jackson Ubuntu Linux - www.ubuntu.com --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Metalink Discussion" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/metalink-discussion?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
